


Queer Eye: Murphy's Law

by BBCotaku



Category: Dear Evan Hansen - Pasek & Paul/Levenson, Queer Eye for the Straight Guy RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Connor gets some selfcare, Connor has a dog, Crossover, Depression, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Makeover, Self-Indulgent, queer eye
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-07-26
Updated: 2018-07-26
Packaged: 2019-06-16 16:19:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,953
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15440919
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BBCotaku/pseuds/BBCotaku
Summary: After almost three years of living on his own Connor is dragged, unceremoniously from his life of isolation to take part in an episode of Queer Eye.(Inspired by @letmeusequestionmarks on tumblr)





	Queer Eye: Murphy's Law

**Author's Note:**

> So, I saw a post by [Letmeusequestionmarks](https://letmeusequestionmarks.tumblr.com)being like "Connor should be visited by the Fab Five" and I was like...HE SHOULD.
> 
> This fic is probably not going to be too long, it's just a little side project while I procrastinate TTT. 
> 
> TW: Implied self-harm and anxiety.

 

Being a security guard--especially a  _ night _ security guard--meant that Connor was pretty damn good at sleeping through everything and anything. Car Alarms? Easy. Thunderstorms? No problem. Someone battering down his door at nine am on a Sunday? He’d barely move a muscle. The one thing Connor could never force himself to sleep through, however, was his dog. 

Trigger, despite being a hundred-and-twenty pound rottweiler, was a quiet dog by nature. Usually, at least. But that Sunday he’d barked to his fullest, scratching at the door like he was trying to dig straight through the damn thing. 

“What is it?” Connor muttered, burying his face into the arm of his couch. He was still in uniform and his collar dug uncomfortably under his chin. He needed new laundry powder. He was probably allergic. 

Someone knocked at the door again and Trigger sucked in a loud, deep howl. 

“Give it a rest, Trig. Jesus Christ.” Connor pulled his blanket over his head, exposing his feet in the process. 

Someone knocked at the door and Trigger barked. 

Connor sat up. “Fine! I’m coming!” He scrunched his blanket up into a tight ball and threw it down by his feet. He’d been asleep a total of three hours, he didn’t have time for this bullshit. 

Neither did the person at the door apparently, because they kept knocking. 

It took a moment for Connor to actually get the door open and pull Trigger back at the same time. He yanked him by his collar, a horrible spiked thing he’d been meaning to replace for months. The spikes dug into his palm, making him wince. 

“What the fu--” His voice jumped back into his throat. 

“Hey.” Zoe Murphy pushed past her brother without waiting to be invited in, making a beeline for Trigger. Connor had adopted Trigger for a variety of reasons, one of them being how terrifying the old boy looked. Needless to say, today the dog was failing him.

Trigger gave a final bark, wagging his tail as Zoe bent down to scratch at his fur. 

“Since when did you have a dog?!” she asked, well, squealed. 

Connor let go of his collar, letting Trigger run circles around Zoe. Last time he’d seen her she’d been a bratty seventeen-year-old. Now, she was an adult. “What are you doing here?”

“I asked first--What’s his name?”

“A year ago. Trigger. What the fuck are you doing in my house?” 

“A one-room isn’t a house.” Zoe flinched a little as Connor’s jaw tightened. “Mom sent me.”

“Fucking great.” Connor slammed the door shut and made his way back to his couch, plonking himself down into his usual crease. 

“What? You didn’t think you could just walk out and not hear from us, did you?” 

“Worked for three years, didn’t it?” 

“ _ Connor _ .”

“ _ Zoe.” _ He did his best to mimic her voice, rolling his eyes. “Look, just tell me what Mom wants. I need to sleep.” 

“It’s nine o’clock.” 

“Yeah, and I get off work at five. What’s your point?” 

“Five?! Jesus, where do you work?” 

Connor tapped the badge on his chest that said  _ New York Historical Society.  _

“Sounds boring.”

“This is boring.” 

“Fuck you.”

“Fuck  _ you! _ ”

Zoe rolled her eyes. “I can always leave.” 

“Good. Leave. I didn’t want you here in the first place.” He patted the couch beside him and Trigger hopped up. 

Zoe scowled at the two of them. “Fine. But you won’t get to the really important news I’ve got for you.”

“Did nan kick the bucket?” 

“No.”

“Did dad kick the bucket?” 

“No!” Zoe pinched the bridge of her nose. “Take this seriously, Connor.” 

“I am! I’m just trying to work out what wonderful news was worth waking me up—“

“Mom got on this tv...reality show...thing,” Zoe interrupted, shutting him up. 

“Let me guess,” he said after a moment’s silence. “Dr Phil. I can see it now. ‘Asshole parents won’t leave their son the hell alone.’”

Zoe grabbed the blanket off the floor and threw it at him. “Shut up!” She snapped. 

He swatted it away. “I’m just trying to make up for three years of not talking.” 

“Don’t you dare try and blame this on us. No one forced you to leave.” 

“Says you.”

“Yeah. Says me.” She crossed her arms tightly. “So shut up and listen.” She drew in a small breath. “You ever watched Queer Eye?” 

Connor raised an eyebrow. 

“I’ll take that as a no. You nominate people to go on it and she nominated you.” 

“I’m not gay,” Connor said automatically. 

“I’ve seen your internet history. If you’re straight I’m king of Australia.” Zoe ignored the finger Connor raised at her. “You don’t have to be gay to go on it. They give you like...a makeover and make your house all nice and stuff. In my opinion, you don’t deserve it.”

“I don’t need it.” 

Zoe kicked an abandoned Chinese takeout box with her foot. “Yeah. You do.”

“I’m not going on some show.” 

“Yeah. You are.” 

Connor got to his feet. Zoe had definitely grown since he’d last seen her, but he was still a good head taller. Enough to look intimidating at the very least. “I’m not going on some bullshit show to have someone tell me I look like crap and stick me in a suit. If I wanted that, I’d go home.”

“It’s not like that.” Zoe stood up as straight as possible. “They help people.” 

“I don’t need help.” 

“Mom knows about the hospital.” 

Connor’s stance faltered and he took a slow step back. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” 

“Oh, bullshit Connor.” Zoe walked back over to Trigger, taking Connor’s place on the couch. She ran her fingers through his fur, doing anything to avoid meeting his eye. “Just do the show. She’s trying to be nice.” 

“I don’t want—“

“I don’t care what you want. I want Mom to stop worrying that she’s gonna get a call from Heidi saying something worse than fucking alcohol poisoning.”

“And she thinks a TV show is gonna fix that?”

“Nothing else has!” 

Connor’s mouth formed a hard, straight line. He didn’t look at her, he just walked. It was a habit of his. One that acted up when the walls got too close and his hands got all antsy and his knuckles itched and there threatened to be another hole added to the collection forming on his wall. 

He went out the front door, slammed it shut behind him and just  _ walked _ . Usually, he would have taken Trigger with him, but he couldn’t now. He didn’t want to catch Zoe’s eye and blow up in her face. He wouldn’t give her the satisfaction. 

He was too tired for this shit. Too tired to listen to some asshole on some dumb show to tell him he couldn’t deal with it. To tell him he was disgusting and gross and a monster. 

Connor stopped once he reached the end of his street. It had been raining and he hadn’t even noticed. He wanted to scream. He wanted to curl up on his couch and get some fucking sleep. 

_ She was probably lying to you _ , he realised.  _ Trying to wind you up. You’d never get on a TV show. That’s what normal people do and you’re Not Normal.  _

His collar was sticking to the back of his neck now, itching like crazy.

_ She wanted you to freak out, and you did. Well done. Your kid sister kicked you out of your own apartment. Top tier adult right here.  _

He pulled at his hair a little. He’d kept it long since leaving high school and it now rested just below his shoulders in thick curls.

_ You took the fucking bait, asshole. _

He made a beeline for a bus stop, hiding under the shitty, tin shelter. He was way too tall for it, so his head rested against the roof but it was better than the rain. 

_ Melodramatic fuck. _

He felt like his brain was being scribbled over with marker. Like his skin was too tight. He guessed that was what happened when a person didn’t talk to another human for… 

Connor narrowed his eyes, thinking. He hadn’t spoken to anyone in a long while. A very  _ long _ while.  That was the point. That had been the plan: move out, get a job, never talk to anyone with the last name ‘Murphy’ ever again. Simple. Easy. 

Obviously not, since he’d somehow managed to fuck that up. Like he did everything else in his life.

Connor closed his eyes, scrunching them up so tight that blobs of colour swirled around the backs of his eyelids. For a long moment he just stayed like that, listening to the rain drill against the roof. 

He drew out a low, deep breath. His mom had been big on breathing exercises and made little post-it notes of breathing times. 

_ 7-4-7. _

_ 4-7-8 _

_ 5-5-7 _

She’d stuck them around the bathroom mirror--much to Zoe’s chagrin--like some kind of weird serial killer code. He was pretty sure she’d made half of them up, but he didn’t exactly have much to lose. So, he drew in a deep breath, counting to seven in his head before deciding he’d counted too quickly and adding another three. He held his breath until his lungs hurt and exhaled. 

Zoe wasn’t the kind of person to drive forty minutes just to fuck with someone. She wasn’t that petty. She wasn’t like him. She was Normal and Nice and people liked her. She was the kind of person who didn’t need a bullshit makeover.

—

Connor took the long way back to his apartment, stopping for a moment to order a suspiciously cheap wrap from a food truck. 

By the time he’d arrived back at his apartment (after managing to convince a neighbour to buzz him in), he found it empty apart from Trigger, of course. 

A part of him, a very small part, had imagined coming home to find that Zoe at least straightened things out, or left a note with a soppy, heartfelt message or something. But, no. Everything was exactly as he’d left it, well, almost everything. 

She’d turned his TV on. 

Connor didn’t watch much TV. He blamed Cynthia for that. Since he and Zoe were small the Murphy siblings had been restricted to two hours of TV a day, and  _ only _ two hours. Once Connor became a teenager and got his first laptop he’d naturally, started bending the rules. After all, Cynthia didn’t know what youtube was, and who was he to tell her.

He was used to pirated streaming, webshows and bootlegs, not adverts. Besides, it wasn’t as though he had time to binge shows between work, sleep, and if he was really feeling crazy, food.

Zoe had signed on to her Netflix account and left it open on episode one of Queer Eye, taunting him. 

Connor sat down on the couch, eyes fixed on the five assholes grinning at him from the tv screen. 

Trigger shifted, resting his chin on Connor’s lap with a loud huff. 

“Yeah, she’s annoying isn’t she?” Connor muttered, giving him the last little bit of his wrap. “I don’t need a dumb show. Do I?”

Trigger said nothing, just licked his lips. 

“Good boy.” Connor tapped his foot, being careful to not move his legs too much and disturb Trig. He could just turn off the TV and go to bed. That would be what a Normal Person did, but now, after two hours of dealing with consciousness, his mind was fully awake and thinking. Thinking was dangerous for Connor. 

He stayed still for a very long time before reaching for the remote and hitting play.

**Author's Note:**

> Come bother me on [tumblr](https://bbcotaku.tumblr.com).


End file.
